Welcome to the Piano World Piano ForumsOver 2 million posts about pianos, digital pianos, and all types of keyboard instruments
Join the World's Largest Community of Piano Lovers
(it's free)
It's Fun to Play the Piano ... Please Pass It On!

I have a dilemma. I want to buy a digital piano for my nine year daughter. After browsing the web finally I restricted myself to Roland RP401 and Kawai CN25. Both are very nice regarding to the value for the price. One day wins Roland and another Kawai... Please, can you give some arguments/opinions/feelings helping me to decide ?

I agree that a nine yo is probably able to formulate an opinion on which action and sound she likes better.

One thing that would be important to me: the Roland can record to USB-Stick. Its just WAV and not MP3, but that was a must-have for us.

If it were just these two, I'd be hard-pressed, because I like the Kawai sound and action a bit better than Roland, but I'd really like to have the USB recording for exchanging with friends and family.

Let your daughter decide, you can't go wrong and its probably good for motivation if she chooses.

_________________________
Kawai CN-35. The daughter wanted a piano, so we got one. Now we'll see who learns faster ;-)

@Nitran: nice alternatives... if I had a little more budget, I was thinking about these 2 as well...

I guess there will be some piano teacher helping your daughter? If you know the person, I would also suggest to ask the teacher as well. I would ask the teacher first, and then let the daughter comment...

I believe the RP401 is an older model. It was the equivalent of the F120. If you like the look, you might consider the F130R instead, that is the newer model in a different case.

You would need to try the actions. ISTR people thinking the F120/RP401 action was not as good as the CN24 action last year, but the F130R has a newer action that is supposed to be an improvement. The CN25 has also had action improvements as well.

I really like the case design of the F120/F130 but the music desk is not great. Depending on your height it is not great on any of these anyway though as the music is held pretty low.

I believe the RP401 is an older model. It was the equivalent of the F120. If you like the look, you might consider the F130R instead, that is the newer model in a different case.

You would need to try the actions. ISTR people thinking the F120/RP401 action was not as good as the CN24 action last year, but the F130R has a newer action that is supposed to be an improvement. The CN25 has also had action improvements as well.

I really like the case design of the F120/F130 but the music desk is not great. Depending on your height it is not great on any of these anyway though as the music is held pretty low.

For clarity from a Roland Guy.

The RP401R and the F-130R are both the most recent models from that series.

The F-120 and RP301 were more closely related as they came from the same series.